Today's poem is by Allison Titus

They Are Taking The Animals Out Of The Offices
       

one by one.

Taking away their badges.

Wiping their heart rates clean

from the monitors & cutting

all the wires.

& the animals fidget, trying out their legs

& the animals inhale exhale

testing out their rabbit lungs,

gather up their riot & tender & resign

the sick light

of their desk lamps,

tearing up their blotters.

They are done with this pitch

& toil;

done with this industry,

fluorescent in the trenches —

the burrow & stink of it

the long & the short of it

the supply & demand of it

the patent applied for & pending of it

the blood & the bile & the skin & the milk of it

The animals are leaving

the offices one by

one

          & they run
          & they run
          & they run
          & they run
          & they

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Copyright © 2023 Allison Titus All rights reserved
from Lords of Misrule editors: Rebecca Lauren & Henry Israeli
Saturnalia Books
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission